


A Dozen Hawks Descend

by MooseFeels



Series: In the Garden of Your Love [14]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: AU, Cuddles, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Mild Angst, gardener!dean, teenage!castiel - Freeform, trigger warning: cruelty to animals
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-17
Updated: 2013-06-18
Packaged: 2017-12-15 06:10:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Underage
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/846209
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MooseFeels/pseuds/MooseFeels
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The thing in Castiel's hands is so small.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> TW:offscreen cruelty to animals, handling the aftermath.

"Tell me you can save it," is the first thing Castiel says to him as Dean opens the door. 

He's wearing jeans and t-shirt- painfully casual as blood drips from his nose.

There's something in his hands- something small and bleeding and furry. He holds it closely, protectively. 

"Say yes," he demands. His voice is tight. "Tell me you can save it."

Dean pulls him into the cottage, into the kitchen. The space is small, but it's the cleanest room in the cottage.  Goes to look at Castiel's face but he pulls away. "Forget about me," he shouts. "Take care of the rabbit. Take care of it." 

Dean pulls out his first aid kit. He takes the thing from Castiel's hands. 

Castiel is shaking. His hands are red in places from holding the animal, which is twitching and barely breathing. Dean notes that it has pinhole cigarette burns on its back and cross-hatched cuts on its feet. Bite marks in other places, probably from a (very) well trained dog. It's hurting, badly. It's suffering. It will probably die.

Thunder rings overhead. The lights flicker in the cottage.

"Cas," Dean says, "Cas, I don't think I can."

"You can!" he bites. "You can! If you love me, you can. You'll save it. Please save it, please." He's crying now. Sobbing. 

"Cas," he says, "I don't know how to save rabbits. Right now, though, this guy is suffering, and I don't think he's going to do much more but suffer for a good while longer."

Castiel looks at him, and he looks fierce. He looks like a fighter. He looks like a man. 

He takes the rabbit back from Dean and walks outside. 

Thunder once more, and the bright sheet of lightning.

Dean waits several minutes before he steps outside. 

The dead rabbit sits on the front step. Castiel stands in the rain. Dean grabs a shoebox from his closet and slips the rabbit inside. He pulls Castiel inside. He is still crying.

Dean dries his hair and looks at his bloody nose. Makes a note of his bruised, scuffed knuckles. Wipes his tears away. 

The rage in Castiel's face is like a slap. 

"They were at the lot, behind the art building. I'd biked over to turn in a sketch. The dog had caught it, and they had the knives and I couldn't-" he inhales, a long sound. "Dean, I was so angry and I hit them. I hit two of them before they figured it out. "

Dean pulls his soaked shirt off, and Castiel shivers, squirms where he's sitting and leans onto Dean.  He's cold and wet and upset. 

"Come on, honeybee," Dean murmurs. "Let's get you out of your wet clothes." 

The fury is gone, and only weariness seems to remain. He nods and tugs off his drenched pants and boxers. Dean tosses him a dry pair- a little too big, but they'll do. 

They climb into bed, under the dry covers. Dean holds Castiel close. 

"You did the right thing," Dean says. He runs his fingers through Castiel's hair. "You can't save everyone, dearest, though you try." 

"I hit them," Castiel murmurs. "And it didn't do anything in the long run. It still died."

"It's not your fault that it died," Dean answers. "You can't blame yourself for everything."

"Why not?" Castiel asks bitterly. "You do."

Dean smiles mirthlessly. "Cas, I'm such a fuckup, and I've just been waiting for you to realize, okay? I'm...I'm a human disaster."

"Don't say that," Castiel interrupts. "Don't say that." He straddles Dean's hips and drapes his arms over Dean's shoulders. "You're beautiful and kind and compassionate and patient and you don't make very good pancakes but no one's perfect and-"

"Cas," Dean says, "Cas, I've got scar tissue I hope you never have to see.  I'm not great. I'm not some...saint or something. I'm those things because of you. You might not- you might not have saved the rabbit, but Cas, you saved me, okay? And I mean, that's no rabbit or anything, but I sure appreciate it."

Castiel lays down over the top of him, a long, warm weight. "The world is cruel," he announces, "and you are beautiful."

"Not always," Dean replies.

The rain falls around the cottage. Their silence is melancholy. Neither of them sleeps, instead, they hold each other through the storm and they mourn dead rabbits. 


	2. Same Sad End

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Scuffed knuckles, broken bones.

The pill makes him feel fuzzy and loopy and disassociated and strange. Makes the words all slide together. Makes him feel very sleepy. 

The world becomes pupil-pinpoint narrow on hydrocodone .  
"Castiel?" he asks. "Cassie, are you okay?"

He thinks he smiles- the feeling is ghost-like and reflexive. "Hi, Gabriel," he greets from his perch on his bed. He's not under the covers and he's not laying down. He's sitting upright like a bird. 

When he'd woken up at Dean's a few hours ago, his hand had been swollen and painful. Dean had murmured something about "hard heads" and assorted him back to the house, where Castiel had gone to Balthazar. 

One pretty serious wrapping and a few pills later and it seems like Castiel doesn't  have to feel anything ever again. 

Gabriel looks golden and fuzzy and warm in the low light. Like a lit torch in a cave. "Balthazar said you got into some trouble," he says. His voice is very, very slow. "What happened?"

It feels like as suddenly as he stopped feeling anything, he started feeling everything again. "Gabriel," he says.

His brother's face falls- plummets like a bird shot out of the air- and he leans onto the bed and takes Castiel gently into his arms. "Hush," he says softly. "Hush, it's okay. It's okay. I can fix it."

"No you can't!" Castiel wails. "No one can fix it! They killed it, Gabriel, they killed it and now it's dead and I can't do anything and I couldn't do anything so I hit them." His hand throbs back at the memory. He wants to flex his fingers, feel them fold and release in and out of that fist, wants the letting go of movement but he can't. "I can't fix anything." 

Gabriel's hands are strong and whole, and they wipe the tears from under his eyes. "Cassie," he murmurs, "Cassie, who killed what? Okay? I need you to tell me. Can you tell me?"

"The rabbit," Castiel sobs. "They killed the rabbit and I couldn't save it."

"Who?" Gabriel asks. "Who killed it, Cassie?"

Castiel feels tired, though, he feels so tired. The pain in his hand is gone completely and only a hollow sleepiness stays. "I'm sorry," Castiel says. "I'm sorry."

He falls asleep, dreams about blood and fur. 


End file.
